Prison Architect just got a whole lot more violent with the addition of armed guards. These black clad, shotgun-toting staff are able to put down insubordination with extreme violence. Their mere presence subdues prisoners. They sure would’ve been super useful for Steve in his Prison Architect review.
Introversion have also added a particle effect for prisoners who piss themselves.
“Having trouble with your prisoners? Constant fights and destruction of property? Deploy armed guards and bring your prison under control with force,” write Introversion.
“Armed guards have so much authority that all prisoners nearby will begin to feel suppressed. This is a status effect previously accumulated during a stay in solitary confinement. It means the prisoner is so beaten down by the system that he no longer has the will to resist. He will be compliant to your regime, far less likely to cause trouble. Armed guards can project this effect all around your prison, however there is a downside – prisoners who are suppressed for most of their time in jail will eventually be far less amenable to any attempts at reform, skill teaching etc.”
These long term effects aren’t yet present in the game but are promised for future updates. The authoritarian-leaning nature of the current game recently drew criticism of Prison Architect.
“Armed guards will not use lethal force unless you give them permission,” Introversion continue. “If they see trouble nearby they will shoulder their weapons and fight with their fists. You must give the ultimate order by clicking the “Weapons Free” emergency button in the bottom right of the screen.”
An element to the armed guards that gives a worrying slice of real life is that you can’t rely on the weapons free control. “If they fear they are about to die, they will use their weapons to defend themselves if you’ve given them permission or not.” This could lead to some grim outcomes in a prison riot. I hope that future updates will bring in systems to reflect this – inquirys, tribunals, and dismissals for guard-on-prisoner violence.
“Armed guards will always shout a warning to prisoners unless the prisoner is attacking them or another member of staff, and prisoners will often surrender immediately when faced with the prospect of being shot dead. But things can escalate very quickly if you don’t control the situation. Armed guards are perfectly capable of killing everyone in the area, so you must use this power with discretion unless having an empty jail is your thing.”
Another difficulty armed guards present your prison is the Armoury. “To hire armed guards you must research the Armoury and then construct a room to hold the weapons racks and lockers. The armoury is however a massive security hazard, and prisoners will deliberately target it during a riot or a mass escape. Your most dangerous prisoners will try to break in and arm themselves, which can be very difficult to deal with.”
Prison Architect becomes a more compelling simulation with every update. In that vein, here’s a choice quote from the patch notes “When prisoners urinate or soil their suits (Bowel/Bladder need maxed out) there is now a corresponding particle effect.”
Here are the rest of the patch notes:
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= Armed guards
You can now hire armed guards to patrol your prison, intimidate your inmates, and put down trouble
You must research the Armoury first, and your armoury requires a weapons rack and one locker per armed guard on site
Armed guards have a strong “Supression” effect on all prisoners near them, making the prisoners less likely to misbehave
They can be instructed to follow a patrol from the Deployment screen
They will only use lethal force if you give them permission – by clicking the “Weapons Free” emergency button
They will always shout a warning first, unless a Prisoner is attacking a member of staff (guard, armed guard, administrator etc)
They will also shoot on site any prisoner who is about to escape, without shouting a warning, so long as they have “Weapons Free”
Note: Armed guards who genuinely fear for their lives may still shoot, even if you have not given them permission via “Weapons Free”
Note: The Armoury must be very secure. Your most dangerous prisoners will attempt to raid it during a riot or mass escape event
= New Forestry zone
Automates the process of growing trees for the purposes of felling them and using the wood
Saplings will be planted automatically by Gardeners
Fully grown trees will be felled, and the logs taken to Storage or your Workshop if you have one
Trees now take much longer to grow to full size : 5 game-days on average
Trees no longer scale up as they grow. Instead there are three discreet sizes : Sapling, Young, and Old.
You can no longer remove tree stumps. These will vanish over time after a tree has been felled.
Note: The forestry will spend your money by ordering tree saplings automatically. Be sure you have enough
= Objects toolbar filtering
The objects list was becoming too long to manage, and no longer fitted on a single screen
A new filtering method hides any “room specific” objects unless you are looking at that type of room
Eg the Cooker, Fridge and Sink will only appear in the list if you are looking at a Kitchen
Note: You can press the + button to show the full objects list at any time
= Modding continued
– materials.txt is now additively loaded
– The mod loading screen now looks better and displays the mod name, author, screenshot and description during load
– Added a “Find more mods (Steam Workshop)” button that opens the steam workshop
– Renamed “Steam Workshop” to “Prison Sharing”, and made it list prisons only (not mods)
– Made Prison Sharing sort prisons by subscribed time (newest subscribed prisons at the top of the list)
– Fixed manifest.txt files from being corrupted due to newline breaks in Steam file description. May require people to redownload the mod.
– You will now be asked “Are you sure” when purchasing neighbour plots of land (to prevent expensive mis-clicks)
– The Main Menu screens now scale correctly to high resolution / high DPI screens (eg Retina Mac at 2560×1600)
– Guards now target the nearest misbehaving prisoner during fights, rather than choosing one randomly from those in range
– When prisoners urinate or soil their suits (Bowel/Bladder need maxed out) there is now a corrisponding particle effect
– Fixed : Selling finished license plates or wood manually generated only half the correct sale price
– Fixed : Subscribing and unsubscribing to your own mod in Steam Workshop will no longer delete your mod from your hard drive
– Fixed : The scrollbar in the Staff and Prisoner list screens now works correctly
– Fixed : Prisoners can no longer tunnel under lakes
– Fixed : The contraband window sometimes massively overestimated the supply of contraband
– Fixed some subtle bugs in the Misconduct System, whereby misconduct attributed to prisoners who had long since left was still recorded
– Fixed : Sectorisation of the world could fail if you had a lake covering the top right of the map (All sectors marked as NO ACCESS)